December 19, 2008
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Music Makes all the Difference
I am on a painful quest to lose my small but obscene alcohol gut. I don’t know exactly when it happened, and in the beginning I know it was starting to come out, but while doing my Hulk Hogan poses in the mirror and sucking in the gut, I deceived myself into thinking that it could be hidden. Then the lovehandles came, sitting above my hips. Didn’t notice those until one summer day I was sitting naked in my home watching TV (just because I can). And most recently, it was pointed out by this girl that I was on a date with. I vowed, early on, to start a running regime as soon as I got back to Toronto. One month, hardcore.
And thus it began. And it was brutal. I know that I just needed to get over the hump – the mental struggle your mind plays to try to get you to sleep for another hour, surf the web for a little longer and throw almost every excuse to stop not run. But I overcame it, if ever so pathetically, by starting to run at the treadmills in the gym. Knowing I had to gradually ease it in, I started with smaller intervals. First 10 minutes, then 15, now I’m at 20 minutes of running. My body now aches, but it is a pleasureable pain as I know I’m getting something good out of it. (There is some pain that I don’t mind
).But here is my point: What I find most helpful in getting through the run, is music. It made such a difference, expecially when a hype song was playing. I was at 15 minutes, my body was giving up. Just then, I put on Timbaland’s The Way I Are – and the music just took over my body. I was running harder, faster and to the beat. I can’t explain it, but the rush of energy really made me forget about the timer on my treadmill as it screamed second by second, taunting me as it slowly made its way to 20. I won that battle.
